tariki

I mentioned Blooks in my 28th Sept post, with the threat of more information...🤑As I said, Blooks are a cross between a blog and a book. Creating them has become a hobby of mine, always wanting to publish my own book - and I eventually managed it, even if the print run was only one! The hobby began after my blog on the google blogspot had been going for a couple of years. Fearful that my ramblings would at some point dissolve into cyberspace I started looking for ways to print it off. I eventually found this company in France, Blookup, which did printed books (blooks) of blogs. The reviews were good so I took a chance (and one young lady who dealt with queries, called Angelique, took my fancy.......in my imagination of course) The website was reasonably easy to use, downloading the blog simple, and the editing facilities quite good (and have improved since) The finished product was excellent and my blook, "Dookie's Place - Ramblings of a Pure Land Buddhist" soon sat proudly on my bookshelves. After printing off my blog I had the idea of creating various other Blooks. The process is easy. Google provide virtually unlimited (and totally free) blog space, you cut and paste whatever text you want, then choose accompanying images from Google Images. This last is the best part, at least I find it so. Just tap into "Search" an appropriate word or two and instantaneously vast numbers of images related to your search words appear. These often suggest associations of meaning unthought of, grist to my mind (which loves correspondences and similarities between things often deemed as contrasting, even opposites) Anyway, I now have a library of Blooks. Just one glinch, when a Blook posted to me ended up in Switzerland. However Angelique soon sorted it..😍 Blooks of favorite poetry, a Dhammapada (this, though a Theravada text, now graced with images from zen, the Mahayana and beautiful Chinese landscapes), one of zen, another of favorite articles and verses etc of Pure Land Buddhism, Tang Poetry, favorite prose such as the prologue to Under Milk Wood by Dylan Thomas, popular song lyrics. All considered, one of the best is of Chapter 1 of the Flower Ornament Scripture. This is the blurb I put on the back cover:- "The verses of the scripture given here are the proclamations of a great series of Enlightenment Beings (Bodhisattvas) revealing how each came to realisation. Like all human beings each is unique and the circumstances of their enlightenment are singular. This can be seen as a mythic representation of all the countless acts of kindness, compassion, empathy and love expressed each and every day within our human family." Another favorite was a blook produced for our grandchildren, this during the first months of Covid Lockdown. My dear wife and I came up with various ideas. "The Dong With The Luminous Nose", other poems by Spike Milligan and "lots more" (as the ads always say) One endearing memory of this Blook was when down in Kent playing with the grandchildren, "lego-ing" and whatnot. Our grandaughter ran downstairs to get the Blook, came back and began to sing a few lyrics we had put in of one of her favorite pop songs. As she sang I whispered to my daughter "Don't worry, we took out the rude words". Our grandson overheard and piped up:- "Like 'I hate you' ". Which was endearing.

Hi Joseph, yes, "interesting". As I indicated, I had long admired/envied Jung his dream of Cathedrals being crushed, given my own very mundane dreamscapes. The fish coming along was in that sense quite welcome! I never saw you as a dream buff, but I recognise your interpretation. I don't really feel any need now to argue or "justify" myself, I'm confidant enough in myself to simply waffle away. I think we just have to find a "base" (even if "empty"), or as Merton called it "The Hidden Ground of Love", let go in faith, and from there diversification follows; this and that, opposites - but such are more for "passing over, not for grasping" (as the Buddha's parable of the raft has it) No need to justify them, nor fight over them. And if others wish to dispute anything, so be it. I don't really wish to get involved. I think this is what Dogen meant when he said:- "That the self advancesAnd confirms ten thousand thingsIs called delusion;That the ten thousand thingsAdvance and confirm the selfIs called enlightenment" Hopefully no one sees the above as a claim to "enlightenment", which would be ridiculous. Dogen played with words, and often appears to contradict himself from verse to verse within his sermons and various writings. He said that enlightenment is not the goal of practice, but a way of practicing. Not a final state of "being" but a way to be. What matters is commitment, therefore "authenticity", and as such he was not the "elitist" that some see him as. As one commentator asserts regarding Dogen's view, "however lowly one’s symbols and practices are as in, say, a peasant’s religion, one is nevertheless entitled to enlightenment if and when one uses them authentically. Here is the egalitarian basis for the claim that Dōgen’s religion is a religion of the people." Elsewhere he implies that the journey itself is home and that the road goes on forever. So, resting once again in my Pure Land faith, there is always hope for any bombu (or "foolish being") however wayward at times.

Hi Joseph, yes, "interesting". As I indicated, I had long admired/envied Jung his dream of Cathedrals being crushed, given my own very mundane dreamscapes. The fish coming along was in that sense quite welcome! I never saw you as a dream buff, but I recognise your interpretation. I don't really feel any need now to argue or "justify" myself, I'm confidant enough in myself to simply waffle away. I think we just have to find a "base" (even if "empty"), or as Merton called it "The Hidden Ground of Love", let go in faith, and from there diversification follows; this and that, opposites - but such are more for "passing over, not for grasping" (as the Buddha's parable of the raft has it) No need to justify them, nor fight over them. And if others wish to dispute anything, so be it. I don't really wish to get involved. I think this is what Dogen meant when he said:- "That the self advancesAnd confirms ten thousand thingsIs called delusion;That the ten thousand thingsAdvance and confirm the selfIs called enlightenment" Hopefully no one sees the above as a claim to "enlightenment", which would be ridiculous. Dogen played with words, and often appears to contradict himself from verse to verse within his sermons and various writings. He said that enlightenment is not the goal of practice, but a way of practicing. Not a final state of "being" but a way to be. What matters is commitment, therefore "authenticity", and as such he was not the "elitist" that some see him as. As one commentator asserts regarding Dogen's view, "however lowly one’s symbols and practices are as in, say, a peasant’s religion, one is nevertheless entitled to enlightenment if and when one uses them authentically. Here is the egalitarian basis for the claim that Dōgen’s religion is a religion of the people." Elsewhere he implies that the journey itself is home and that the road goes on forever. So, resting once again in my Pure Land faith, there is always hope for any bombu (or "foolish being") however wayward at times.

Thanks Paul, yes I do understand how some simply prefer to read. I'm finding my own preferences, but I'm a slow learner. It's taken too long! I just like to sit in Costa's and I find there that a lot pours out, a few ideas floating around beforehand but that's about it. This morning there was a feature on Breakfast TV about Music for Dementia. Inspiring. This guy, in the early stages, always a musician, was constantly tapping out on the piano a few chords, just three or four (Status Quo only knew 3 - two more than myself - but made a career out of it) and made some sort of melody. His family, loving and supportive, arranged for some composer to take the simple melody and transform it, bringing in an orchestra to accompany the guy on his piano. Deeply moving and inspirational to listen to the composition, the guy moved to tears, his family looking on. Maybe the key is (no pun intended) that music is "the thing itself" and not a representation of it. This is one of the ways that Dogen interests me, his support of words, recognising their meaning and significance. Wittgenstein once said:-Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent” but if I understand Dogen correctly he would have deferred. Words, like anything else, can be the thing itself . I recently read through the Dogen thread again, on the Other Wisdom Traditions section (that Krapp's Last Tape moment!!) and I said something about Dogen always seemingly having his cake and eating it. Learning more about him I see this as some sort of key. "Every particular contains the universal" James Joyce said it, among others, past and present. Just as any single DNA cell is a blueprint for the whole. In that way I can see Jesus as a "particular" containing the universal. Yet no more so than any other. Once you begin to claim Jesus as some particular,singular particular uniquely unique, prepare for the Inquisitions! Getting back to Dogen, eating his cake or whatever, I think of a little verse or two of Chuang Tzu as translated by Thomas Merton. I've been told that Merton's translations of Chuang Tzu are pretty "loose". Maybe so, but the looser the better I would think. Here is the verse:- "The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits. When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten. The purpose of words is to convey ideas. When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten. Where can I find a man who has forgotten words? He is the one I would like to talk to." As I see it, this does not advocate silence. The "man who has forgotten words" (or woman!) can still speak, in fact, must speak. But having "mastered" words, they would speak in the "now", in the moment, the "appropriate statement", appropriate there, then and for no other time. Meeting another with openess and empathy, hearing them, not speaking at them but with them. In Christianspeak, as the "other" that Christ already "knows". Alas, evangelisation often takes the form of speaking AT others. Merton again:- The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them. Anyway, my coffee is getting cold in the cup. At the moment I have about 8 books on Dogen downloaded on my Kindke. It's a bit of "pic n mix" which is the way I like it. A final name drop......Nietzsche:- "I distrust all systematisers and avoid them. The will to a system is a lack of integrity." Just like "conclusions", system are killers of the spirit.

It seems that I have returned to Sleepy Hollow, but this suits me fine. I'm very quickly annoyed by anyone questioning my waffle in any way whatsoever. I have just been on Facebook, posting another music video. Where would we be without music? Nietzsche once said that without music life would be a mistake. A few days ago I was in Oxfam and this guy came in and we got chatting and he told me about a Prince video, a guitar solo of his when a "supergroup" of musicians were playing George Harrison's "While My Guitar Gently Weeps". This guy gave me a superb air guitar demonstration of the Prince solo, which certainly captured my imagination - even without the music the timbers shivered. Anyway, Oxfam recently added Wi-fi to our shops many delights and after the guy departed (possibly to give another demo in The Heart Foundation or Barnado's - it's all charity shops these days) I took a look at the video, turned the sound up loud, and yes, enjoyed it. Here it is if anyone is interested. If you watch to the end Prince throws his guitar skywards, never to return. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6SFNW5F8K9Y (That must be George Harrison's son in the line-up) PS. I was intending to waffle about "zazen as metaphor", but the cappuccino took its toll. Perhaps another day. You have been warned.

The great thing about Dogen is the total connection of his "practice". For him, dreams, illusions, whatever, are as "real" as anything else. Radical non-dualism. Quite strange at first, but eventually it makes sense. Writing of the finger and the moon, both are "equal", symbol and symbolised are "one". What matters is the authenticity of the moment (AKA mindfulness) Enlightenment for Dogen is/was NOT a state of being that you at a certain point "attain" and "become" , but rather radical freedom which can only "be" in the "now". He was a man of deep integrity, committed to the Mahayana bodhisattva teachings, to "practice" for the sake of future generations. I see, linked to this, the "Gift of Freedom" that Thomas Merton spoke of in "New Seeds of Contemplation":- "The mere ability to choose between good and evil is the lowest limit of freedom, and the only thing that is free about it is the fact that we can still choose good.To the extent that you are free to choose evil, you are not free. An evil choice destroys freedom.We can never choose evil as evil: only as an apparent good. But when we decide to do something that seems to us to be good when it is not really so, we are doing something that we do not really want to do, and therefore we are not really free.Perfect spiritual freedom is a total inability to make any evil choice. When everything you desire is truly good and every choice not only aspires to that good but attains it, then you are free because you do everything that you want, every act of your will ends in perfect fulfillment.Freedom therefore does not consist in an equal balance between good and evil choices but in the perfect love and acceptance of what is really good and the perfect hatred and rejection of what is evil, so that everything you do is good and makes you happy, and you refuse and deny and ignore every possibility that might lead to unhappiness and self-deception and grief. Only the man who has rejected all evil so completely that he is unable to desire it at all, is truly free. God, in whom there is absolutely no shadow or possibility of evil or of sin, is infinitely free. In fact, he is Freedom. " In the same theistic language, God's will is that we be free, and God "is his own gift" (the gift and grace of incarnation) Yes, I know I'm just waffling. I have been on "grandad duty" this morning, getting two little tykes to school in the pouring rain. Just to say, seeing our grandaugher at the bus stop, beneath her "Frozen" umbrella, her little face smiling, beaming, lifted grandad's heart. (Curses of said grandad were saved to later, soaked through, on the bus back home)

As I see it, we agree on this. Not recognising the connection IS "lack of connection". Of course we are connected! All is "one". As Merton says, "What we have to be is what we are". In theistic language, "We are already one with God (who is his own gift) yet how far we have to go to find you in whom we have already arrived.

Impossible not to be conformed to the world? I don't agree. (Of course, it depends just how we define "the world". Given how so many live and act in the world, have lived and acted, their presumptions and apparent acceptance of its "ways", I would say refusal to conform to such is the only possible stance to take if we value honesty, mercy, empathy, love and compassion. Which puts us "in exile", irrespective of just how "successful" we are in living such values) I'm not getting into Biblical interpretations. I am not a Christian and I do not recognise any "revelation" as pre-eminent. Reality is the only revelation (as you seem to imply) I was simply musing upon the implications of the O Felix Culpa, which has a long tradition within the Christian Faith. What "reality" is, is the question. My own faith is that it is "healing". (As I see it, it is "separation" from that reality, our lack of connection to it, that is the "problem". We seem to agree on that)

I was looking for the precise quote regarding the "now" by Dogen's teacher in China. I knew I had it somewhere:- "To teach students the power of the present moment as the only moment is a skillful teaching of buddha ancestors. But this doesn’t mean that there is no future result from practice." (Dogen's teacher in China to Dogen) While trawling through my cyber-notebook looking for the above, another note caught my eye. I saw it as relevant here (but I'm not sure why):- Most Christians would assert that Jesus was sinless. Most Muslims would assert that the Koran is totally free of corruption. But the "zens" ask why a clearly enlightened person can fall into the well. And Saichi (the Pure Land myokonin - "saint") sees his very own wretchedness as "one" with Amida. "Thank you for the favour" he cries, as though speaking to his mum. (A koan, both a truth and a question)

Ploughing on, another day, another Costa's, another stint at Oxfam. Dylan this time I think, once I've had my toastie and cappuccino. A couple of things since tuesday, reading of Bishop Spong saying that we need new ways of speaking of God, plus remembering exactly what drew me back to another forum after a long break. It was a question posed by someone:- "Is the knowledge of good and evil, good or evil"? Yes, believe it or not this drew me back, rather than simply counting my blessings and heading for the exit. Without looking back now to check I think I said something at the time about the O Felix Culpa of the Catholic/Eastern churches, of the necessary fall that "merited so great a redeemer". Fall not of unexpected rebellion and who knows why, but as "necessary". It certainly casts new light upon our existence, its possible meaning, and therefore, as I see it, on any "new" ways of talking about God. I would rather say, new ways of being rather than of talking. Maybe there has been enough talk. A necessary Fall holds promise for any possible theodicy, and suggests a Cosmos of healing rather than one of "trial", "judgement", or the consistency of "justice". As far as Inter-faith is concerned, I think anyone remotely aware of the various Christian mystics knows of the suggested "incomprehensibility" of God. My favorite quote here is of Eckhart, "Nothing that knowledge can grasp or desire can want is God. When knowledge and desire end, there is darkness; and there God shines. " I'm pretty conversant with so called "eastern" ways and I've found they tend to blend into such "incomprehensibility" until it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to see the join. This because such leads inevitably into "being" and not mere talking. What the intellect cannot truly grasp must lead us somewhere, into that in which we "live and move and have our being". Which brings me back to "healing" and any possible meaning to our mad world with all its suffering. I've spoken of Dogen and I find his thought a revelation. Deconstruction before Derrida, post-modern before the modern! Which makes me sound as if I know what I'm talking about. But don't be fooled, its the cappuccino talking. Dogen was big on faith. He had trust and faith in "original enlightenment". His question was, if such was so, "why bother"? His answer, put simply, was "out of compassion for future generations". Which, really, should be enough, unless all we care about is our own skin. One of Dogens teachers, when he was in China, emphasised to him that though the "now" moment was indeed the "only" moment, this did not mean that there was no "movement toward Buddha". Dogen sought the authenticity of the moment, depth, intensity, "the present intimacy, transparency, and vividness of thusness" which "had to be forever penetrated" (as one commentator has said) And he did so within the borders of 13th century Japanese zen, the cards he was dealt. In the words of a western student of zen, who knows his stuff, "Contrary to present conventions, Zen Buddhism developed and cannot be fully understood outside of a worldview that sees reality itself as a vital, ephemeral agent of awareness and healing." He goes on to speak of the liberative qualities of spatiality and temporality. Once again, I had little idea of what I was going to waffle about. I'm trying in some ways to keep sane. The world is too much with me, and I will not be conformed to it. What do you do when you don't experience orthodox sentiments? Can you go on accepting the world that lives by them? He is already in exile." (Joseph Campbell, speaking of a character of Joyce, Stephen Dedalus, the literary alter ego of Joyce) I simply have to have faith in the healing nature of Reality-as-is. Such is my Pure Land faith.

Strange to pick the above out, but I sat down at my post in Oxfam (to wait for the first customer of the day, perhaps any hour now) and logged on and those words fired a few chemical processes. I must admit first that I have dipped down among the The Cafe's threads and find them far more congenial than the various debates. Quite interesting to read. I'm beginning to see most things as chaotic and that interpretation is everything. When I left the Bible behind (apart from one or two verses, especially "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness", which needs no commentary) I saw its text as some sort of rorschach test. Some sought to thrash it into some sort of order according to a particular theology but to me, in vain. Obviously, from there, if Reality is the only "revelation" then it to must be such a test. What you see is what you get, or as the zen master Dogen has said, "we are what we understand". "Interpretation is not an isolated act, one thing among many that we do; it is what we are, the pivot, the crux of our being." (John Caputo, speaking of Heidegger) Recently I created another Blook, a cross between blog and book. I might tell you about it one day. It was "The Songs of Leonard Cohen" based upon a concert he gave at the O2 in London in 2008. A mate of mine, a good friend, had stepped forward during a time of trial and he sought no reward. But he had said he loved Leonard Cohen ( "real poetry" ) and so I enjoyed creating the Blook, lyrics cut and paste, images chosen courtesy of Google Images. Download to Blookup, edit, order. Two copies this time, my biggest print run. I mention this because of "interpretation". When I come to choosing images for blooks and their varied contents it is often relatively simple. But not so with Mr Cohen! Often the ambiguity tied me in knots. Much like Reality itself. Another one is James Joyce and Finnegans Wake, written in Wakese, a combination of English, French, German, Latin, a few more lanquages, plus colloquialisms drawn from an Irish upbringing. Try this one....."The Gracehoper was always jigging ajog, hoppy on akkant of his joyicity." Beautiful! You find what you want, what you are. Grace and hope perhaps. Happy only because of hops? And kant? Cant? The pulpit of miserly grace dished out in return for....what exactly? Did Joyce intend all this? Or more? Or less? Or something else? Samuel Beckett said that Finnegans Wake was not about anything, it was the thing itself. Whatever, Joyce took 15 or more years to write the book, squinting late into the night, filling many notebooks. His long suffering wife Nora would hear him from her bedroom, chuckling merrily to himself as he punned and twisted language beyond all recognition. (Apparently she would often plead with him to write something that people could understand, obviously having her eye on possible royalties. But Joyce was a notorious cadger and had no need to earn his money) More from the Wake:- "A dream of favours, a favourable dream. They know how they believe that they believe that they know. Wherefore they wail." Or, more simple:- "They lived and laughed and loved and left." (Yet how "simple" is that, if it would be "the thing itself"?) Well, I never intended to waffle on like this. Still no customers, the Travelling Wilburys on the player. Looking at the "Other Wisdom Traditions" sub-section I see I was keen on Dogen back then. I still am. He is very much "where its at" with his marvellous words from Genjokoan:- "Therefore, if there are fish that would swim or birds that would fly only after investigating the entire ocean or sky, they would find neither path nor place. When we make this very place our own, our practice becomes the actualization of reality" Profound words. Without "knowing" we must find our very own path, time and place. Most have them allotted and are content to then play the cards dealt them. I think, if we find ourselves with questions, that we must delve deeper. It can become lonely, even frightening. Thinking of Samuel Beckett, some see him as one of the 20th centuries greatest writers, even philosophers. Beyond a couple of his plays, I'm not familiar enough with his writings to judge. But I was quite taken with his "Krapp's Last Tape" (I suspect "Krapp" is a bit of Wakese......) This play concerns a guy who likes to record himself waffling on every few years or so (good grief! Did I just write that?) and when he listens to it back years later he has lost all connection, not recognising himself at all. Well, something like that. Anyway, it's his last tape. No more. When I read through the Dogen thread I had this terrible Krapp moment! I'll say no more. But to finish with some upbeat words of Beckett, who is more known for pessimism I suppose, but these words come from the ninth monologue of Beckett’s 1954 "Texts for Nothing" which offers a literal translation of the four concluding words of Dante's Inferno:- ‘and see the stars again’ (‘a riveder le stelle’). They are spoken by a tramp-like waif as he contemplates death:- "There’s a way out there, there’s a way out somewhere, the rest would come, the other words, sooner or later, and the power to get there, and the way to get there, and pass out, and see the beauties of the skies, and see the stars again." Good words. Finally, as I began with Leonard Cohen, here are a few words of his song "Anthem":- The birds they sang At the break of day Start again I heard them say Don't dwell on what has passed away Or what is yet to be Ah, the wars they will be fought again The holy dove, she will be caught again Bought and sold, and bought again The dove is never free Ring the bells that still can ring Forget your perfect offering There is a crack, a crack in everything That's how the light gets in

Thanks to you both for the welcome. As I said, I don't really go much on dreams. Like anything I would think investigation would yield some sort of "result" - but I'm not sure what. But thank you again romansh and PaulS. (PaulS, your signature made me think of the zen quip:- "Better to see the face than to hear the name." Which in turn made me think of a line from Joyce's Finnegans Wake:- "Let us leave theories there and return to here's hear." )

The previous post was a cut and paste job, tapped out while at my daughters, who has no wi-fi (being installed today) Now I am seated in Costa's, extra hot cappuccino and a round of toast. When I spoke about my dream I also thought of a dream of Jung, this when he was in his early teens. The family atmosphere was a bit claustrophobic with his father over religious. Jung's dream was of seeing God high above a giant cathedral, and a large turd dropped from God's posterior, crushing the cathedral. (Certainly mere fish, dead or alive, cannot compete with such as this!) Anyway, for Jung, such was the end of what could be called "organised religion" with its creeds and dogmas. If only we could all dispense with such nonsense as easily. I say nonsense, but maybe it has its place. There is a quote concerning T.S. Eliot regarding this (yes, I still like a quote or two.....or three.....or four) This is it:- Eliot feels no compunction in alluding to the Bhagavad Gita in one section of a poem and Dante's Paradiso in the next. He neither asserts the rightness nor wrongness of one set of doctrines in relation to the other, nor does he try to reconcile them. Instead, he claims that prior to the differentiation of various religious paths, there is a universal substratum called Word (logos) of which religions are concretions. This logos is an object both of belief and disbelief. It is an object of belief in that, without prior belief in the logos, any subsequent religious belief is incoherent. It is an object of disbelief in that belief in it is empty, the positive content of actual belief is fully invested in religious doctrine. Well, that's it. Very suggestive and maybe discussion of it belongs in another section. For me I have long related to the self same idea, this from reading the views of the Christian theologian John Hick, who sought to argue that God should be at the centre of the World of Faith, around which the various religions circle. Obviously, not content with this, many like to place their own particular creed at the centre, maybe as an "only way". But as Meister Eckhart has said:- "They do him wrong who take God in just one particular way: they end with the way rather than God." But anyway, even my extra hot coffee is cooling and I have shopping to get.

I'm back because of a dream. Not one for dreams, most forgotten as soon as awake, but last night a rather strange one. Vivid. A thin tape was hanging from out of my cheek, this seen in a mirror. I sought to pull the tape and it just kept coming out, turning larger, about an inch across. Finally, at the tape's end, a fish, not large, not small, it popped out of the hole in my cheek. No impression as to whether it was alive, but it looked fresh but did not move. That's it. Strange enough to cause me to look up dream interpretations. One thing caught my attention, of fish representing opportunity; which made me reflect on just how I have been thinking on and off recently. Leaving three different Forums for various reasons, thinking my days were finally done with waffling on about whatever. Yet also thinking, just maybe, I need some sort of outlet for expression - I've realised that most of it is simply talking to myself , and perhaps I need to do it. We all have our strange ways. Did the dream tell me that I was pulling out a needed form of expression, killing an opportunity I still needed to take? Anyway, PLEASE do not see this as an opportunity for dream interpretation. I'm happy with my own. I got into the habit on other forums of posting "Memo's from the Pure Land" where, as I sat in Costa's Coffee shops, I felt secure enough to let it all hang out and waffle contentedly. Most, I think, saw me as harmless. Things have been tough lately, what with Covid and family. My resilience has been, and is, being tested. But we all have our problems. So here I am. "The Cafe" aka "Chat" would seem to be the place for this and for any subsequent "Memo's", which tend to range far and wide. Thank you. Or as we say in the Pure Land, Namu-amida-butsu.

Hey, I never thought of that one Burl. I wish I could give you more than one Housemark.

The eminent exponent of zen to the west, D T Suzuki, once said that eventually, after all our explorations, we would become again the old Tom, Dick or Harry we always were. Well, if that is the case, I think I just might have made it- though in my own case it is Derek, Dookie or Tariki..... Yes, I'm now back to being the mixed up, often confused and stumbling idiot I was back in my younger days before my conversion to the Lord and the start of it all ("all"?) In celebration, I have added a new blog, the text of which is to be found below:- My blog is going into print - yes folks, the "vanity project" of the year. The initial print run is of one copy and I have jumped in quick and bought mine before it is sold out. But seriously ( I think ), I did want to print it out. Whatever is held exclusively on a PC is always in danger of disappearing in an instance, even though such disappearance would often be considered a mercy by many. Well, my blog is on Google - but then, is even Google eternal? Anyway, I googled "print out blog" and up came a site "Blookup" which promised to print out any blog for a fee ( of course ) Their site was easy-peasy, even for a non-geek like myself. They imported the entire blog, gave options of fonts and type size, made it easy to design your own cover - back and front - and also offered a very good editing option. A detailed preview of the finished blook is given, "exactly as it will be printed", all indexed. Editing was a bit of a bain. Obviously videos had to go, so farewell Frank Zappa, and the Stones strutting out "Start Me Up". Also the Dalai Lama and the "make me one with everything" joke. Then all the "pictures on the left" ( or right, or up, or below ) had to be amended to "the right" ( or overpage, or above, or whatever) Surely Google could sort this out, I cried in despair.But finally the job was done. My Blook is at the printers. For those of you who just might be slower to catch on............Blog.......Book.......thus BLOOK. Well, the full blog can be viewed WITH PICTURES on mydookiepops.blogspot.co.uk. (Sorry for this, I have always said that my sense of humour would get me into trouble one of these days) .

Not suggesting I am a hero of any description () , the idea is Joseph Campbells. He seems to see everything in the context of this idea. Not so sure myself. Anyway, I am reading his "Creative Mythology" at the moment and would recommend it. Nice pictures and the ebook has less typos than some of his others - though I had to laugh at the point where he quoted the zen master who said that we "must seek the face we had before we were BOM"........ Moving on, I had a dream last night where I saw and met once again the old guy who converted me to the Lord all those years ago. I think he must be long gone now ( with the Lord? ) and I only stayed with his version of the Lord for about six months. But in the dream I thanked him and told him it had changed my life for the better. I remember though that his face dropped when I added that I had moved on. Well, my reading "inspired" the blog below, to be found ( with illustrations ) on mydookiepops.blogspot.co.uk. So my own journey has been to return to where I started and knowing it for the first time (where have I heard that before?) The simple love for another. I am still ploughing on with Mr Joseph Campbell, now with his "Creative Mythology". I have reached Chapter 3 and a section entitled Symbolic Speech. Here is how that section begins:- The best things cannot be told, the second best are misunderstood. After that comes civilised conversation; after that, mass indoctrination; after that, intercultural exchange. And so, proceeding, we come to the problem of communication........ What sort of "problem" is communication? What exactly needs to be communicated? What would we wish to be communicated? Turning once again to Thomas Merton, in one of his very last talks before his untimely death, he had this to say:- True communication on the deepest level is more than a simple sharing of ideas, conceptual knowledge, or formulated truth...............And the deepest level of communication is not communication, but communion. It is wordless, it is beyond words, and it is beyond speech, and it is beyond concept. Not that we discover a new unity. We discover an older unity. My dear brothers and sisters, we are already one. But we imagine that we are not. And what we have to recover is our original unity. What we have to be is what we are. So, if this is correct, what we should wish to communicate is the means of becoming who we are. (At this point I would just say that more often than not I am talking to myself, even learning from myself. Whatever anyone else may or may not gain from wading through my blogs, in writing them I clarify my own thoughts. Often things come together, for better or for worse) Just thinking back I remember the little story of the Jewish guy who travelled far upon hearing of a certain holy man - not to hear what he had to say but "to see how he tied his shoelaces." I think all good stories are multi-faceted but this one now takes on added resonance in the context of the questions raised here. Anyway, onward, from the Jewish to the Japanese. There is an old word in that language, menju, meaning "face to face transmission", person to person, a learning not to be found in books. I learnt about this in a book (!) and its author, Hiroyuki Itsuki, spoke there of his own attempts to learn. Itsuki spoke of all the philosophers he had read and yet, he said, he had "learnt more from his father's sigh" than from any of them. His father's sigh when, at the end of a long day, life's ambitions thwarted once more, he sunk down upon his bed. Others have said that we can only ever truly learn that which is already in us, that which we already know at some level. If true, this would bring me back to "salvation" being recognition, realisation, and not any accumulation of knowledge. Which again suggests that, indeed, we are already one, and that what we have to become is that which we already are. By grace we recognise grace in others; I think not by seeing perfection in them, but simply by seeing their humanity, pure and simple. Lay your sleeping head , my love, Human on my faithless arm...... .....but in my arms till break of day Let the living creature lie, Mortal, guilty, but to me The entirely beautiful. (W H Auden, lines from "Lullaby") I have never really been sure of the exact meaning - or meanings - of the whole of the poem "Lullaby" by Auden. I have gathered it speaks of "gay" love. Of what else I'm not aware. But I have always loved some of its lines. Moving on, but on the same theme, the love of Heloise for Abelard, a truly tragic story recounted by Joseph Campbell in "Creative Mythology". Campbell summarises the love of Heloise after first calling it "(perhaps) the noblest signature of her century":- (her love was) not the natural, animal urgencies of lust, nor the supernatural, angelic desire to glow forever in the beatific vision, but the womanly, purely human experience of love for a specific living being, and the courage to burn for that love were to be the kingdom and the glory of a properly human life. So, communication, or rather communion. That is it for now. Just the final thought that the love of Heloise was unrequited. Does it take two to tango? Thank you

Seeing in the dark I saw this on TV a day ago and it has stayed with me. A young child who feels far more confident simply because she cannot see. She plays the piano as well.

Just thought that I would post a short history of my time on Discussion Forums, now that I have in effect retired. It has been a personal journey and for me, fulfilling. I'm going back a few years to when I first got on the Internet. Maybe about twenty years ago. A whole new world, at least for me. What do you look at? Pondering, I remembered a Buddhist magazine, Tricycle and wondered if they had their own website. Sure enough, yes, and I found it and looked over a few articles and photos of various Buddhas and Buddhist wannabees sitting on cushions seeking to meditate their way to nirvana. Scrolling down the Home Page I spied the words "Bulletin Boards" and wondered what they were. Perhaps private ads along the lines of "Buddhist, GSOH, wishes to meet like minded for zafu sessions". But no. Investigating I saw that here we had a rich assortment of various people, with "screen names" such as Dharmakara, Lotus Flower and other such exotic titles, all raising questions, answering back and forth, and all sounding quite knowledgeable as far as Buddhism was concerned. For a couple of days I read a few of the threads and then the thought popped into my head..........I too could register, I too could assign myself a name, I too could join in the talk, actually express a point of view. Believe it or not this thought gave me the collywobbles. Did I have the nerve? Seriously, my hands shook and my heart thumped. Nearly fifty years old and the thought of expressing an opinion, even on the relative anonymity of the internet, filled me with apprehension. But nothing ventured, nothing gained. With trembling hands I registered. As a first swipe at the obvious conventions of the media, I gave myself the name of "Dookie", a name my daughter had often called me - I have no idea why. Then I had to decide upon my very first post. There was a deep discussion taking place between two suitably named worthies, posting back and forth on various points raised by the classic zen book "Zen Mind, Beginners Mind" by Shunryu Suzuki, a book they obviously relished and admired. Me, it was one of those books I had found it hard to get into and in fact never really got into it at all. To be frank, it had bored me rigid. Should I say this? Should I step in and have my say? I hesitated but then thought that if I feared to do so and held back, what was the point? So in I went, speaking my mind. I was totally ignored! The conversation carried on around my meagre and rather paltry post as if Dookie was non-existent. Perhaps the fate of so many in this world. But Dookie was made of sterner stuff; what does not destroy us makes us stronger says Nietzsche. Soon I was back on another thread and this time drew a response! Someone in cyberspace had actually read my words and seen fit to answer! Very soon, another thanked me for "making my day" and I have to admit, this almost reduced me to tears. The thought that words of mine had touched another's emotions. From then on there was no stopping me. An English teacher in the USA, in fact a published novelist, sent me an email and told me that I was one of her "favourite voices on the Boards", another asked me where did I get my wisdom from. I never associated myself with wisdom and told them so in one way or another. The fact is that for me it was a question of self confidence, self esteem. There is a thin dividing line between this and pride. I tried, and endeavour, not to cross it. Good to take to heart the words of Honen, one of the "fathers" of Pure Land Buddhism, who said:- "When a scholar is born they forget the Nembutsu". Everything that is truly of worth is a pure gift of Reality-as-is; given, not attained, realised, not earned or gained by merit. Anyway, eventually I learnt that Dookie was a word in the USA used by children for poo, a fact that threatened to tarnish my reputation just a little, not to mention forestall any suggestions of wisdom. But I soldiered on. The Bulletin Boards on Tricycle finally disintegrated, unmonitored they sunk under their own weight of spam, flaming, sledging and insults. So much for Buddhist ethics But I had the bit between my teeth. I registered again and again on various Boards. Christian, Secular, Atheist, Agnostic, Islamic, General, Ex-Christian, Inter-faith and various new Buddhist forums. Two hiccups when once I was censured for a "racist" post ( I had posted of my thinking that Wei Wu Wei was a "wizened little Chinaman" before finding out his true identity as the Irish Aristocrat Terence Gray) and then received a lifetimes ban on another when I crossed swords with the Administrator who took exception to my implying that a post of his was based upon gossip. But it has all been good for me. I have retired from all Boards now after perhaps 30,000 posts or so. In my time I have been called a hypocrite, a liar, the "voice of satan", even the Anti-Christ; I have been called wise and been called stupid. I have been known as Dookie, Tariki, Cobblers Apprentice and one or two other equally preposterous names, as the mood took me. Generally I have sought to be polite and truthful. We can only try. One of my fondest memories of meetings in cyberspace was various exchanges with a guy in Sri Lanka who had ambitions to become a Theravada bhikkhu (Buddhist monk) who eventually thanked me for extending his knowledge of the Buddhist Scriptures. My worst? Crossing swords with a member of a Fundamentalist Christian Sect whose bigotry, which he was totally oblivious to, was, to me, shocking. In the end, as the wag said, "There are only two types of people in the world, those who divide the world into two types of people and those who don't". There is great mileage in the zen advice that if we wish to know the truth then "cease to cherish opinions", simply because, as per the great parable of the raft, the Dharma is for "passing over, not for grasping". For me this has its echo in the Gospel advice not to judge others. From being afraid to say boo to a goose I will now say what I like, when I like. If not now then when? Anyway, I have cut and pasted this from my blog, and the full illustrated edition can be found by those who enjoy punishment, on:- http://mydookiepops.blogspot.co.uk Thank you

Thormas, sorry, we are just talking past each other. The bottom line is "enlightenment", seeing. Classification, dissection, can follow, but first we must see. To classify, value, dissect, speak of higher and lower, as part of a pursuit of "understanding", this because it is "fun" to do so, is to miss the mark and merely to wander about to no purpose. How do we come to see? Ask me another. Do I see? Ask me another. Thanks, but that's it.

Once we give some sort of "value" to the asking of questions we leave no-thing-ness behind. But is that "better" than equating ourselves with the situation of a fly or a spider? "Do not see yourself as better than others, nor as less than others, or the equal of others" ( Buddha )

"Does a dog have Buddha nature?" Is maybe an "eastern response", at heart a question rather than an "answer". The stock "answer" is "Mu", or "nothingness ". To say either "yes" or "no" is to miss the point, or rather, is to enter the world of dualism. What is required is an "appropriate response", the teachings of a lifetime. So we can have ourselves as "special", something "worth the wait", made in the image of a prior creator, transcendent to ourselves, or we can truly ask the question "as if our hair is on fire" and express our own appropriate response. I was reading a novel by Charles Bukowski, "Pulp", where right at the beginning the main character, a Private Eye, sitting in his office, swats a fly, thus "taking it out of the game", his stance towards even himself, a man awaiting the moment he will be swatted away. Apparently Bukowski is admired for his "honesty". What is "honesty"? Does a dog - or even a spider - have Buddha nature?

One was "The Quantum Astrologer's Handbook" by Michael Brook. Rather than write anything new about this book, I will regurgitate previous waffle as per my review on Amazon:- Entertaining Possibly this book could be described as whimsical. It seeks to combine the life of Jerome Cardano, a sixteenth century Italian polymath, with the latest understanding of quantum mechanics. Personally I was totally lost amid the quantum sections and reveled in the often lecherous life of Cardano, a man involved with probability theory as well as the Inquisition, who dabbled in medicine and astrology. A man of his age no less ( like all of us, as Michael Brooks suggests ). The word "probability" provides some sort of link between the biographical sections and those on quantum physics - Michael Brooks ends by calling us "travellers in the dark" , thus dealing at times only with probabilities. While we can say with some degree of statistical certainty that say, a set percentage of those in their nineties will die in any one year, it remains uncertain as to the fate of any particular nonagenarian. That I can understand. Large, predictable. Small, apparently random. After which I am lost. Extrapositional, entanglement, photons in two positions at once - and one or two algebraic equations did not help my understanding, particularly when a x b was, as far as the quantum world is concerned, definitely not the same as b x a. Still, fear not, we are all in "travellers in the dark". Mr Brooks in fact tells us that we are all left to our own interpretations and he implies - I think - this has a correspondence with the fact that any measurement at the quantum level effects the position of whatever is being measured. Something to do with a cat, but as I say, I was lost. The cat was either dead or alive. All is random? "Love has no why" says Meister Echart. The observer is king? What are the teachings of a lifetime? "An appropriate statement" says Yun-men. I see all this combined and inter-relational. Constantly entertaining. I read it in a couple of days and enjoyed it a lot. Thank you Another was a Graphic Guide, "Introducing Quantum Theory". Never actually reviewed this but I liked the pictures, especially the cat on the cover

I suppose Christianity could be called "sin and the ending of sin", possibly the sunshine is in the ending. The "latest" is as I said, drawn from one or two excellent little books. Also included were cats ( either dead or alive ), things in two places at once, influence from a distance.........all under the proviso that if you think you understand it you don't understand it. Quite a helpful tip.

The latest on "time" from the quantum world seems to suggest that our own default linear experience is not the final word. Apart from that, I'm back with "I teach this and this alone, suffering and the ending of suffering" ( Buddha ) Meanwhile there is speculation to while away the hours.